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Wednesday, August 19, 2015

Hi! I'm Mary Ann from SPECIAL ED SPOT.I am so excited about guest blogging here at Special Sparkle. Today, I wanted to share an awesome app for documenting and monitoring progress.

MONITORING PROGRESS

One important thing in teaching and especially in the Special Education classroom is keeping track of student progress. Monitoring progress not only shows you, as the teacher, the growth students have made in skills; it also provides documentation as to what you have taught for your records and for your supervisors.

KEEPING PARENTS UPDATED

Keeping parents informed as to the levels their child is functioning on, how they are progressing on goals and objectives on the Individual Education Plan (IEP) is a vital part of our jobs as teachers and of great concern to parents of the kids we work with. Working with children in special education classes makes it even more important to communicate with parents and share what their child is doing in the classroom.

These days, documentation of monitoring progress is a vital portion of a teacher's evaluation portfolio and used in to determine their "grade" or effectiveness when being evaluation by administration. What if we could streamline all of that and teach the kids technology, responsibility and independence all at the same time?

One little tool I recently came across that can do all of this is SEESAW, a digital portfolio app. In the description of the app in the iTunes store, it calls itself a student-driven portfolio. Anytime I can foster independence in my kids in my self-contained special education classroom, I say, "Let's go!"

QUICK PEEK

Come, let's take a quick peek at this app for its use in a special education classroom. This powerful little program is designed to allow students to sign in and upload their work to their digital portfolio. The teacher has overall power of approval of what is part of the portfolio. Each piece added by the students sits and waits for approval from you before its actually added to the portfolio.

The first thing you do once you have downloaded and opened the app is to set up your class. I have added only first names for this example but of course you would add all of your student first and last names.
Now here comes a cool part. Seesaw lets the students sign in. Now in a special education classroom like I used to work in, the students' disabilities might make it difficult. Remembering names and passwords for sites they use can also be challenging.
Seesaw lets the kids sign in using a classroom QR CODE poster. The students can use an iPad or other device that will read QR codes to sign in. Easy, right?

Seesaw even provides direction posters unique to your classroom that have limited words making it easier for students to log in. I created a simplified version that would make it easier for the students in my special education classroom.
Once that is done, the students will see this screen.

They can now select what type of entry they would like to add to their portfolio. If they select PHOTO, they can take a picture of a paper document, drawing or computer screen. Click on the green check and then it shows you what has uploaded and will also show that it is waiting for approval.

You can add video, drawing, photos, etc to this snappy app and the kids can even draw on the screen and then save it to their portfolio.

PARENTS CAN LOG-IN TOO!

Seesaw lets parents login using the Seesaw Parent app and see only their child's work with separate logins. The only thing I can see with this app is possibilities.
This could also be a useful tool at parent conferences to go over accomplishments, goals and objectives in IEPs.
It has the potential to make kids in Specials Education classes more independent by allowing them to record their work and increase the pride they have in their work.
If the students are not able to interact with the app independently, perhaps they can do it with supportive or participatory prompts. It has the potential of being able to fit many students of different ability levels.
This app would be a valuable tool in any teacher's back pocket to record and document activities, and even take pictures of behavior data tallies and sheets in quick and easy manner.
Now, here is the best part of this.....SEESAW IS FREE! YES- FREE! You can use it in the classroom or it can be used school-wide with administrative viewers available.
Here is a free copy of the directions I made.

Take a look. Someone at my school shared this app's availability with me a few months back, but once I got into it, I never want to go back.

Sunday, August 2, 2015

Hello! The Sparklers have greatly missed all of our wonderful readers. As is the nature in special education, things got a little busy in SPED world and A Special Sparkle took a little break. I am thrilled to announce that we are back with some new authors, as well as some of your old favorites. As always, shoot me an email to make a request about a topic you'd love to read about. We are just in time for the annual TeachersPayTeachers Back to School Sale, so it's a great time to check out our stores too!

About Me

For those who are new readers, let me introduce myself. My name is Lisa Parnello and I am the creator of A Special Sparkle. I have been teaching for 10 years and I currently teacher 2nd/3rd grade students with language based learning disabilities such as dyslexia. This past year I became Wilson Certified and was promoted to Instructional Coach in addition to my teaching duties. I also lead the tech team at my school so you'll likely be seeing posts from me about technology in the classroom.Take a peek at my best selling item Social Skills Reminder Cards on TPT while it's on sale, plus get an extra discount on TPT with the promo code BTS15

Meet Our Authors

Christine Reeve

I’m Chris Reeve from Autism Classroom Resources and I have worked for 20 years helping teachers and staff help students with autism or other developmental disabilities. I am an educational consultant and a behavior analyst who has done everything from being a behavior specialist for a preschool for children with special needs, running a program for students with challenging behavior and autism, directing research and behavioral services, and consulting to school districts for individual students and programmatically. I love my job and I love creating resources and strategies to give teachers the tools and training they need to be effective with their students.

Hi
Everyone! I am Mary Ann Reeve and I am ecstatic to have the opportunity to
collaborate here on Special Sparkle. Special Education has always been at the
heart of my teaching as well as my life, whether I was teaching students with
Specific Learning Disabilities in resource classes, working with students with
significant developmental disabilities in self-contained classrooms or teaching
elementary general education classes.My
educational background of a B.S. in Specific Learning Disabilities K-12 and
Elementary Education with certification in Early Childhood was perfect for me
until I taught and was inspired by a special little boy I had in my Specific
Learning Disabilities classroom to seek out training in teaching children with
Autism.So after
20+ years of teaching I returned to college to get my endorsement in teaching
children with Autism. and was thrilled when I found this very special niche
within Special Education. This opened a whole new world of teaching for me and
I LOVED every minute of it.Since my retirement this
past school year, I am looking forward to creating and sharing the materials I
make online and collaborating with other special educators full time.Personally, I came to teaching naturally, inspired
by a family of educators and growing up with an older sister who has autism. In
addition to all of this I also enjoy photographing nature and spending time
with my pugs.

Hey there! I’m Erin and I blog over at You AUT-a Know. I have worked with kids since I was 15 and taught swim lessons! I am starting my 6th year of teaching students with moderate to severe disabilities. My classroom is ABA based and highly structured. I love my job, sharing my expertise, creating unique materials for special learners, and I particularly love my awesome students #iteachawesomekids

I'm going into my eighth year of teaching special education. Prior to becoming a sped teacher, I was an aide in a special Ed classroom for five years. I teach a self contained class for grades 1-5 with diverse disabilities that currently includes students with Autism, ID, SLD, EBD, and OHI. My sped specialty is behaviors, especially children with EBD. I hold a B.A. and M.Ed in special education and a M.S. in cognitive behavioral disorders with a focus on EBD. Check out my best seller: Science for a Year 60 Hands on Teacher Tested Experiements

Lisa Caughlin

Natasha Boysal

Alyssa Zimini

My name is Alyssa and I am an Autism & Multiple Disabilities Grades 3-5 teacher in a collaborative setting. I have my undergrad in communication disorders and because of that have a love for communication, assistive devices, and language supports.

Sunday, November 16, 2014

During the last seminar I attended of the IDA conference I
had a profound “ah-ha!” moment! It was the session I wanted to attend and was
so close to avoid signing up for in favor of an earlier flight home after a
long week. I am so glad that I went!

I have a student who was my “project kid” last year, and is
still in my class this year. For those who are not my regular readers… every
year I pick a “project.” It is my mission to help the one kid in my class that
always seemed to fall through the cracks before I got them. The kid that no
teacher has found a way to bond with, or previous strategies just didn’t click
for the student. Every year, I make it my unfaltering mission to help that kid!

Last year I helped “that kid” and he’s made tremendous
gains, but he has a ways to go. As I sat in the last seminar I finally found
the reason that I believe he fell through the cracks. This child has features
of several disorders, but not the solid definition of any. He’s the kid that
every single specialist or testing facilitator has said, “I’ve never met a kid
like him!”

I attended Michele Berg’s lecture entitled “Working Memory and Dyslexia: An exploration
of the relationship between reading skills and short term, long-term and
working memory functions.” Less than 10 Minutes into the lecture about working
memory, I was completely enthralled. Within 15 minutes, I mentally screamed “OH
MY GOODNESS THAT’S JOSH!” (Pseudonym of course).

This got me thinking… how many other kids could we have
missed? How many kids have a working memory disorder that is not clearly
defined or noticed? I’ve reviewed Josh’s file and I know he has significant
delays in this area, but it was by no means the most alarming of his test
scores. Yet, every single concern we have had over Josh’s struggles has fallen
into the exact realm of working
memory outlined in in the presentation. I know and understand working memory, but never made the connection to the various areas it can affect.

With this in mind, I have realized how little training
teachers receive regarding working memory and its functions. There are things
we often associate with other disorders that can be clustered together to show
an overarching struggle with working memory. With this in mind, I created a
graphic organizer to help show some of the overarching functions of working
memory. Read on to see it examined more in depth.

Working memory is the ability to process information by putting it to use, and it is used when switching between short and long term memory. For example, it is not simply repeating words, but being able to hear a list of words and then place them in alphabetical order and do something with the information.

What is it?

Organization

Often students with working memory issues struggle with organization and executive functioning. This occurs when their brain struggles to process what they are doing in relation to things happening around them. They often forget in the middle of a task exactly what they should be focusing on. They struggle to tune out things happening around them and focus on the important information at hand. This often occurs when writing because they forget what they were writing in the middle of concentrating on spelling and forming a sentence.

Concentration

Students with working memory delays often lose concentration because it is too much information for the brain to process. The brain becomes overloaded and easily distracted. Students often daydream during classes or busy conversation because they cannot keep up with the discussion.

Remembering Tasks

Students who have trouble processing information, in turn have trouble recalling the information, even when they have been attending to the task. This may happen in reading when they read all the words, but cannot tell you what happened in the story. Their brain was unable to process the information it was taking in. Students may lose their train of thought and forget what they were talking about, even when they had a clear point in mind.

Problem Solving

These students may struggle with complex reasoning because they cannot grasp a multi-step problem or situation. This can become especially clear during math problems with multiple steps where they lose track of what they have done. They will often lose track while counting as well.

What can you do?

Rote Memory- While this isn't ideal, you can teach kids to memorize and allow things to become automatic

Mnemonics- You can teach kids strategies such as mnemonics to remember information. This is often most effective when relating it to an image rather than the first letter in a list of words

Associations- Students often remember information better if they can associate it to something simple and familiar. Teach kids to chunk together information they know and is related.

Reduce Workload- This does not mean to reduce the work a child does. It refers to reducing the amount of work the brain needs to do! For example, have a student sound out a word in chunks instead of the whole word at once. Example: Pester could be sounded out as "Pe...pes...pest...pester" which reduces the number of parts of a word the child needs to read at a time. The same can be done with sentence reading.

Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Hello friends! I have a great article lined up for you about social skills in the classroom, but I'd like to start with a little taste of social skills books and their importance at school and at home.

I had the pleasure of reading a cute little story called Demanding Dudleyby Deneen Renae, which is part of the new Wiblets series. The book can be purchase from Amazon by clicking on the image below.

As a special education teacher, I've learned stories are one of the best ways to engage students and teach valuable social skills lessons. I was happy to discover a new series to help teach these important skills.

I used this book in two different ways to test out the target audience for the series.

In the Classroom

This year my class is a group of 1st and 2nd grade students with mild/moderate learning disabilities (dyslexia, ADHD, etc.) and the students range in age from 6 to 8 years old. The book is a little bit lower of a level than I generally read to my students, so I chose to make the book part of a larger lesson.

My students always benefit from reminders for expected behavior, so I jump at any chance I get to include them in lessons! I used Demanding Dudley to introduce the concept of a beginning, middle and end of a story in preparation for creating our own story outlines in the future. The students thought the book was funny because of the way the character acted in the story. They were able to identify the moral of the story by showing how Dudley behaved in the beginning, how mom taught him to make a better choice in the middle, and how Dudley made better choices in the end to get what he wanted.

While the kids enjoyed the story and it reinforced a good lesson, it was clear the book would be perfectly suited for a younger crowd, such as kindergarten for both the length and content.

At Home with Preschool Age Children

I am currently living with my niece and nephew who are 3 and 4 years old, respectively. This seems to be the ideal audience!

After reading the story at school, I brought the book home. When the kids saw it they instantly wanted me to read it to them. The bright colors and lovable character grabbed their attention right away! The kids were fully engaged and even ignored the cartoon on the TV in front of them so they could hear the story.

My little niece was talking to the book and liked the main character. Her older brother was able to compare the beginning of the story to the end and told me Dudley didn't get what he wanted until he asked nicely. This is a valuable lesson in our house because both children are at the perfect age to learn their manners. They have been taught this skill, but the story reinforced it in a fun way because they often forget to use their manners.

The kids enjoyed the book so much that they asked to read it again as soon as I finished! After a second reading my 3 year old niece asked to "read it herself" and she pretend to read the words as she looked at all the pictures.

I also visited the Wiblets website, which also grabbed their attention right away because of the bright and beautiful illustrations. My niece and nephew chose the color page and were eager to color a picture of the character they just heard about in the story.

Wednesday, April 2, 2014

April is National Autism Awareness Month (NAAM).NAAM began when the Autism Society of America
envisioned a week focused on the needs of the autism community and was
formalized by Congress in 1984.April 2
is World Autism Awareness Day was begun in 2007 and includes Autism Speaks’
Light It Up Blue campaign for autism.The
latest research, released last week, shows us that across the U.S., 1 in 68
children are diagnosed with autism.The
numbers vary significantly from state to state and this represents a 30%
increase over the numbers released 2 years ago.Autism is the fastest growing developmental disability and chances are
that most of you reading have had some experience with autism professionally or
personally or both.Autism affects
everyone—all genders, races, ethnic origins, and countries.It also affects everyone around it beyond the
individual. It affects the family (immediate and extended), the school, the
workplace, the community, and our national economy.Autism costs the nation $137 billion a year
and that is expected to increase significantly in the future as the incidence
rises and as the growing number of children diagnosed grow up. For more facts about the impact autism can
have on families and the community, check
out this post.

Probably one of the most quoted sayings in the autism community
has been attributed to Stephen Shore:

One of the things that makes this population so challenging
and wonderful simultaneously is that every one is different.I have been practicing in autism for 25 years
and just when I think I’ve seen every variation of autism, I find a new
one.Sometimes the difference is the
characteristic of autism and how it manifests itself.Sometimes the difference is how it impacts
the family or those around them.And
sometimes it’s how it combines with other difficulties the person
experiences.

So, it’s hard to describe what autism is because of all its
variations.Autism is a spectrum
disorder.This means that it actually
spans a number of spectrums.Some
children are gifted intellectually and some have an intellectual
disability.Some individuals may have very severe autism while others’
may be mild. This is complicated more by
the fact that this severity and the impact on the person’s life may change over
time. So a child who displayed mild
symptoms at a young age may show more severe issues when they get older. Sometimes it’s because other problems, like
mental illness, crop up, and sometimes it’s just because increased stress in
their environment increases the exhibition of symptoms of autism.

However, there are elements that are common characteristics
of the disorder, although they may look different for each individual.To receive a diagnosis of autism spectrum
disorder (which is the new classification and the diagnostic system no longer
includes Asperger’s or Pervasive Developmental Disorder), an individual must
display differences in communication skills, social skills, and restricted or
repetitive behavior. That does
not mean that all individuals with autism are nonverbal or not social.Instead, it means that some have difficulty
communicating effectively, taking others’ perspectives, relating effectively to
others,or don’t know the unwritten
social rules of interactions.For more
information on the signs and symptoms of autism and how it can look in
different individuals, I highly recommend the Autism
Internet Modules.You will need to
create a free login but there is a great amount of information available in all
of their online learning modules including many strategies for helping students
in the classroom.In popular terms,
think about it this way.

Have you met Sheldon
from the Big Bang Theory?People,
including the creators, commonly see him as an individual on the spectrum.Have you met Max from Parenthood?His character is identified as having
Aspergers.Have you met Ray from Rainman?Have you met Temple Grandin? This is
just some examples of people on the spectrum.

Over the course of this month, A Special Sparkle, as well as
some of our personal blogs, will be sharing information and our experiences
with autism.We also have a number of
special events going on.

I have a link up of TPT stores that are having
sales on Wednesday and Thursday (4/2/14 & 4/3/14) that you can check out
HERE.Fifty percent of my proceeds from
my sales this week will be donated to the Autism Society of America. Not everyone's store will be on sale, but you can find great special education resources at the Special Sparkle bloggers' stores.

There are Facebook cover pages and profile pics
on my blog HERE
that you can download to show support of the autism community on social media.

There will be a linkup of free resources for
teachers who work with students with autism across the spectrum.You can find that as it develops HERE.That linkup will stay on my blog through the
year, so you can always check back to it to access free resources.

Check out more resources about autism as well as
ways to show support during National Autism Awareness Month at the Autism
Society’s NAAM page.

And as we move through April and beyond, please share your
stories of your experiences with autism in the comments, as well as resources
and examples you want people to be aware of.
Autism brings with it many challenges, but we also need to recognize the
gifts it brings in individuals who often are not caught up on pretense and who don’t
always set limits on what they think they can achieve based on what others
think as many who do not have autism might.So with that thought, I want to leave you with a TED talk by Temple Grandin….Because
the World Needs All Kinds of Minds.

About Us

This blog is designed to be the best of special education blogs all in one place! Our authors have a wide variety of experience in special education and are excited to share their knowledge. We have experts in many areas such as autism, learning disabilities, and so much more! We are here to share our best resources and help you with your questions about special education!